1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the fields of cooling gaseous fluids during compression and of diluted combustion.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventional power systems experience major reductions in compressor capacity and net power with increasing ambient temperature, especially during summer peaking of demand. Some precooling or “fogging” of the intake air is being done upstream of the compressor. In relevant art, further water overspray has been used to entrain water droplets into the compressor intake to cool the air being compressed. Some systems provide intercooling between low and high pressure compressors using sprays of cooling liquid (or liquid diluent). Some relevant art uses flash evaporation and/or swirling nozzles have been used to reduce spray drop size.
Relevant art fogging, overspray, and intercooling technology experience limitations in the amount of water evaporated and/or entrained into the compressor because of operational limitations within the compressor, such as surge, choke, and stall as well as concerns over blade erosion. Non-uniform fogging and water overspray have been observed to impact downstream combustion spatial temperature distributions in axial turbines. These in turn degrade the desired downstream transverse temperature distribution at the inlet of the turbine. Such deviations from design can reduce turbine airfoil life and/or require lower mean temperatures that reduce system efficiency.
Efforts by relevant art to achieve full evaporation of the water before reaching the compressor airfoils and/or with the low degree of relative mixing prevents evaporative cooling from reaching or saturating much of the fluid flow being compressed especially at the downstream end of the compressor. Some relevant art advises putting most of the water spray nearer the upstream end of the compressor to increase the overall benefits from cooling flow.